8 things you need to know about Social Security

GlennRuffenach

Imagine that you’re about to accept a new job, and it’s time to talk salary. You sit down with your boss, who begins as follows:

“Actually, our payroll system is impossibly complicated. You can pick from dozens of different ways to be paid and hundreds of different start dates, and each will produce a different salary. We offer some guidance, but we’re short-handed. As such, deciding when and how to collect a paycheck is essentially up to you.

“So…what would you like to do?”

Welcome to Social Security.

Overlooked Social Security strategies

(3:01)

Jeffrey Maggioncalda, Financial Engines CEO, suggests that retirees wait to claim Social Security, even if that means drawing from their 401k or taking on part-time work, to maximize their retirement income.

Each day, thousands of Americans apply for the first time for Social Security benefits. And each day—if questions from our readers and the stories we hear from financial advisers are any indication—many applicants have no idea what they’re getting into. They know little or nothing about the program’s complexity, the myriad ways to collect benefits and the Social Security Administration’s staffing and service problems.

As such, they’re putting their retirement—and, in many cases, their spouses’ future—at risk.

“People spend more time planning a vacation than they do planning for 20 or 30 years of Social Security benefits,” says Barry Kaplan, chief investment officer for Cambridge Wealth Counsel in Atlanta. Those benefits, he notes, are insurance against market downturns, hyperinflation and living longer than you anticipate. But would-be beneficiaries, he says, typically “go into this without a clue.”

If you and/or your spouse are weighing your options about Social Security, here’s a look at some of the biggest issues—involving both the agency and the benefits program—that could shape your retirement for better or worse.

The Social Security Administration isn’t your financial adviser

A fair amount of the mail we receive from readers with questions or complaints about Social Security goes something like this: “My Social Security office never told me about….” About a particular strategy for claiming benefits. About a little-known rule. About the consequences of starting one’s payouts at a particular point in time.

No, the Social Security Administration isn’t perfect. (More about this in a moment.)

But its primary job is delivering a service, paying 59 million beneficiaries, and not financial planning. The agency provides loads of information about benefits on its website and does its best to answer the public’s questions in its field offices and by telephone. But a comprehensive talk about the nuances of Social Security and your financial future? That’s not going to happen.

Indeed, the Social Security Administration doesn’t know about—and it isn’t the agency’s job to know about—your household budget, your health, your savings, life insurance, plans you might have to work in retirement. In short, all the variables that should go into a decision about filing for benefits, says Kaplan in Atlanta.

So, the onus is on you to learn about, or find help in deciphering, the basics: how benefits work, claiming strategies, possible pitfalls. And if you’re hellbent, for instance, on grabbing a payout at age 62 (the earliest possible date for most people) and locking yourself—and perhaps your spouse—into a permanent reduction in benefits, the agency isn’t going to stop you.

The Social Security Administration is stretched increasingly thin at the worst possible time

In March, Carolyn Colvin, the agency’s acting commissioner, didn’t mince words in a report tied to President Obama’s request for additional funding for the Social Security Administration.

“Our service and stewardship efforts [have] deteriorated,” she said. “In fiscal year 2013, the public had to wait longer for a decision on their disability claim, to talk to a representative on our national 800 number, and to schedule an appointment in our field offices.”(See also: Social Security office closures irk retirees, senators.)

The agency, in short, is overextended. In the past three years, it has lost 11,000 employees, or about 12% of its workforce; by 2022, about 60% of its supervisors will be eligible to retire. Meanwhile, budget cuts have resulted in the consolidation of 44 field offices, the closing of 503 contact stations (mobile service facilities) and a delay in plans to open eight hearing offices (where appeals about agency decisions involving retirement and disability benefits are heard) and one call center.

And that 800 number? According to a report in December from the agency’s inspector general, wait times in 2013 exceeded 10 minutes, an increase of more than five minutes from 2012.

The point: The Social Security Administration is grappling with its own problems just as the baby-boom generation, with about 75 million members, is moving full speed into retirement. (The oldest boomers are turning 68 this year.) The demands on the agency mean that you might not be able to find, or find in a timely fashion, the information or help you need. That said…

More services outside Social Security are offering more help

The Social Security Administration is the first to acknowledge that benefits are complicated. The opening paragraphs of the agency’s “Social Security Handbook,” a guide to the benefits program, state plainly: “The Social Security programs are so complex it is impossible to include information [in the handbook] about every topic.”

Fortunately, a growing number of tools and services—some free, others for a cost—are available to help people navigate these waters.

In recent years, AARP, the Washington-based advocacy group for older Americans, and T. Rowe Price Group Inc., the Baltimore-based mutual-fund company, have introduced sophisticated online calculators that help users determine how and when to claim benefits. Both are free. (The Social Security Administration has several calculators, also free, that can help determine the size of your benefits, but not necessarily when to claim them for maximum effect.)

The earnings test deters people from working in retirement—and shouldn’t

Social Security’s earnings test, in which benefits are reduced if a person is collecting benefits and income at the same time, generates numerous questions and much confusion. But the apparent penalties aren’t what they seem.

If you are under your full retirement age when you first receive Social Security benefits and if you have earned income, $1 in benefits will be deducted for each $2 you earn above an annual limit. In 2014, that limit is $15,480. In the year you reach your full retirement age, the penalty shrinks; after you reach full retirement age, the deductions end completely.

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